


no choice

by deadratz



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Angst, First Kiss, M/M, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, Will Graham Has Encephalitis, no happy ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-12
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-19 00:36:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29991234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deadratz/pseuds/deadratz
Summary: Will wants to kiss Hannibal post-fall, but can’t make himself do it. No matter how badly he wants to. By the time he works up the nerve, it’s too late.
Relationships: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Comments: 34
Kudos: 79





	no choice

**Author's Note:**

> Read the warning, I’m serious. 
> 
> I don’t know why I wrote this! I’m sad about it! I did not go back and reread it because it was too sad to write. Hope you enjoy!
> 
> Also the tense change is intentional, but I’m not entirely sure if that is obvious when reading it so I’m just letting you know.

Will didn’t have much choice but to go with Hannibal after they plunged off the cliff. He was dragged from the churning Atlantic, coughing, bleeding, screaming. No choice but to let Hannibal’s strong and sure arms carry him away from the water, away from the end he intended for them both.

He was pulled from the beach, half carried, half dragged, up stone steps, back to the house on the cliff. Where Hannibal tended to their wounds with a gentle touch. His eyes were tired, but his steady hands never faltered. He never lost that from his surgeon days, being able to carry on with surgery even if his body is screaming at him to just… stop. 

There was no choice in the matter when Hannibal put pills and a cup of water in his hands and waited until Will took them. No choice in the matter when Hannibal made him undress and get into the shower, no choice in the clothes he was given after, no choice at all. Because Hannibal was just making these decisions for him, and Will didn’t want to try and figure it out himself. 

He had wanted to  _ die  _ but Hannibal didn’t give him the satisfaction. So he had no idea what he was supposed to do next. Hannibal had a plan, though. He always did. 

Hannibal had gotten them to a boat, with Chiyoh there waiting for them. She got them to safety while they slept in the cabin. Only waking to use the bathroom or take more painkillers. They rarely spoke. In fact, they never spoke unless to ask each other if they needed anything each time one got up to use the restroom. 

For once, they had nothing to say to each other, and yet they had everything to say, all at once. 

A few times Will woke up, curled around Hannibal’s body, an arm thrown over the man’s chest. Sometimes he woke up and Hannibal was the one curled around him. It was never unwelcome.

It happened so often that Will found himself needing to be constantly near Hannibal. Sleeping, eating, even showering together. But nothing more than that.

It came as no surprise when Will found himself in love with Hannibal. He had no choice in the matter, just like everything else so far since Hannibal saved them. It happened when they were finally at their new home in the south of France. Secluded and safe.

Will was sitting outside on their balcony, catching the last rays of sun for the day when the sliding glass door opened and Hannibal’s footsteps could be heard behind him. His eyes had been closed, basking in the golden light.

He opened his eyes when Hannibal moved in front of him, cutting off the light with his body, casting his shadow over Will’s face.

The light formed a halo behind Hannibal’s graying hair, he wore nothing but a pair of swim shorts, and in his arms- a small puppy. And that’s when Will realized he loved this man, this serial killer, this source of stability in his life.

“I found her on the way home from the beach,” Hannibal said quietly. “She’s quite dirty, so I assume she is a stray.”

Will immediately sat up and opened his arms for the dog. Hannibal passed her over, then went into the house again. And Will wanted to kiss him so badly in that moment, but he couldn’t. He had other things to worry about, namely the dirty, skinny puppy in his arms. 

Hannibal came back after he put on a shirt, and helped clean her, then looked her over for injuries. Will make her food with what they had around the house already, while Hannibal sat on a stool at their counter watching him. 

That’s the night they finally talked about the night on the cliff.

In their shared room, in their shared bed. Will felt he had no other choice, after Hannibal had let him stay silent for weeks. He owed it to Hannibal. 

“I wanted to kill us,” Will said. He held the dog in his arms as he spoke, sitting up, cross legged on his side of the bed. Hannibal stayed in his own space, and while Will wanted to reach out and draw him closer, he knew it wasn’t the time.

“I was able to deduce that,” Hannibal replied. “May I ask why?”

“Because there was no way I was going back to Molly,” Will told him. “And because I felt like it would be impossible to live with you, but even more so to live without.” 

“And how do you feel now, Will? Is it impossible to live with me?” Hannibal asked.

“At first I felt like I had no choice,” Will said, honestly. “But now, I feel like I’m glad I didn’t have that choice.”

Hannibal had nodded, had reached out to run his thumb along the healing scar on Will’s cheek. Will had thought Hannibal was going to kiss him, but it never came. Instead, they just gazed into each other’s eyes. And it had felt so familiar to Will, that he realized they’ve always been moving toward this moment in time.

Toward a mutual understanding, to peace in each other’s company. No trying to kill each other, no locking each other up in prison. Just calm. And Will wanted to tell Hannibal how he felt, but he knew Hannibal knew already. The need for words had surpassed them. 

Will knew Hannibal was in love with him, but he never mentioned it. Their days were spent comfortably. Hannibal would go out some nights, and Will would wake up to the smell of sausage cooking in the kitchen. Will never mentioned it. Didn’t want to destroy this peace they had built.

And every night they would get into their shared bed together, with their dog, who Will had named Abigail, asleep in her bed across the room. 

And every night, Will wanted to close the space between them and kiss Hannibal. He never could. He could never build up the nerve to do it. Not even when Hannibal would pull him close and bury his face in Will’s hair, deeply inhaling. Not even when Hannibal whispered those three words to him.

“I love you,” he had said one night. Will wrapped around his body, head on Hannibal’s chest. Listening to the normally steady heart beat jump as he said the words. And Will knew then he should have sat up, looked down, repeated the words, then leaned in. He didn’t do any of those things. 

Instead, he tightened his arms around Hannibal’s body and buried his face in Hannibal’s chest. 

It was enough. It was always enough to just be close, to talk casually. He didn’t need to kiss Hannibal, he didn’t need to tell Hannibal he loved him back. He didn’t need to until he realized he should have. But by then it is too late. 

The morning it happened, months after they settled in France, Will thought he was really going to be able to do it. He thought he was going to lean in, kiss Hannibal, then take him back up to bed after breakfast. That they would make love, and kiss, and that Will would say those words to Hannibal, because that was what Will wanted to do. He wanted it so bad, but the plan could never come to fruition. And Will regrets it every day.

Because Jack Crawford kicks down their front door and doesn’t even hesitate to fire his gun this time. And Hannibal has already moved in front of Will, taking the bullet and falling to the ground. 

“Hannibal, no, no,” Will cries, falling to his knees next to him, the light going from Hannibal’s eyes. “Baby, I’m so sorry. I love you, I love you.”

He leans down and kisses Hannibal’s lips. Will puts his hand over the wound on Hannibal’s chest, blood covering his hands as Will’s tears fall into Hannibal’s face. Hannibal is gasping, starting to choke on the blood filling his lungs. 

“This wasn’t my plan,” Hannibal gets out. Will kisses him once more, holding his face with two bloody hands. They stare into each other’s eyes until there’s nothing left behind Hannibal’s. His last words to Will are, “I have never loved anything as I have loved you.”

And then Will is being dragged off his body, screaming, wailing. He has no choice. No choice but to let Jack’s arms drag him away from the end that Will had never intended for him and Hannibal. 

Will doesn’t stop screaming until his throat is raw and it hurts too bad to make another sound. He doesn’t stop crying until he’s so dehydrated that nothing comes out. He doesn’t remember anything between the time Jack dragged him away, to the time his back hits a thin mattress. A BSHCI mattress.

It’s only then that he’s aware of his surroundings. Somehow he was brought back to America, thrown into the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane. In Hannibal’s old cell. And that sets him off, yet again. Screaming until Alana Bloom walks in through the doors and stands on the other side of the glass. 

He ignores her, curls up on the bed and cries for Hannibal, cries for himself because he should have told Hannibal sooner, kissed him sooner, before he was taking his dying breaths. And Will knows he has no choice but to accept this end, but he doesn’t want to. He doesn’t want to. 

His head is pounding, he’s sweating in the jumpsuit they gave him. And Will knows. He knows he lost the last several hours of time. It all makes sense now. How Hannibal would smell him, inhale deeply, and frown. Will had just thought that entire time that he smelled bad, but now he understands. 

His encephalitis is back. And Hannibal knew, and… 

Will gets up from his small bed and wipes his eyes, then looks at Alana. 

“How did Jack find us?” Will asks. It doesn’t come out quite right. His throat hurts like hell from his screaming. He already knows, but he needs it confirmed. 

“Hannibal called him,” Alana says. “And we need to know why. I figured you wouldn’t want to see Jack.”

“Why would I want to see the man that killed the only person who has ever loved me for me?” Will snaps. “I don’t know why Hannibal would call.”

But he does know. He knows it’s because Hannibal couldn’t give him the treatment he needs. Couldn’t take him to a hospital because they would be found that way. Hannibal couldn’t watch Will’s health decline anymore. He had thought they would both be taken back to the BSHCI, so Will could get treatment there. So they could escape again later.

It would have been the perfect plan, Will can see it clearly in his mind, knowing that’s exactly how Hannibal would have wanted it. If it had worked. But it didn’t. 

And now Will is going to refuse his treatment. Because he found that while he could live with Hannibal, he cannot live without him. There’s no way he is even going to try. 

Alana starts to notice the symptoms. Asks Will about them, but Will threatens to kill anyone that touches him. Anyone that tries to stick any needles anywhere near him. 

He had a choice this time, could have accepted the treatment, could have kept living. He has a choice, and he chooses to die. He chooses Hannibal, just as he felt he couldn’t have before. But he realizes, the choice was always his. He always chooses Hannibal.

The encephalitis eventually takes over his entire brain. The last thing he thinks about is Hannibal and that one kiss they shared. He remembers the day they met, hazy from the inflammation taking over his skull. He remembers the first breakfast they shared, and the last. 

When it finally kills him, he made that choice. 


End file.
